The Contexts and Typologies of Literary Source Materials in Cyprian Ekwensi’s Burning Grass: Focus on the Actual and Typical Realities

Abstract

This paper examines the typologies as well as the contexts of literary source materials in Cyprian Ekwensi’s Burning Grass. Particularly, this paper’s focus will be on how various kinds of realities, otherwise the source materials, represented in Burning Grass, (like the aspects of nomadic Fulani culture, identity, and environment), can be classified either as ‘actual’ or ‘typical’ realities, specifically from the reader’s point of view. Therefore, this paper aims to elucidate on what informs this study’s categorization of literary source materials either as ‘actual’ or ‘typical’ realities. In a bid to attain a plausible explanation, this paper contextually analyzes material in the focused study Burning Grass, and applies the researcher’s field experience as a means of evaluation the primary data essentially from culture-specific perspectives.

Key words: Actual, Nomadic Fulani, Realities, Source Materials, Typical, Typologies